Imagine the scenario : Cameron makes a promise to tell the EU to shove it where the sun doesn’t shine and then probably yell at the top of his voice: “I want my money back” (sorry David, that one’s already been said, a long time ago now…dead and buried, in fact). Now his back is up against the wall, because he’s told the people (read: the British taxpayers), who are now happy because for once they are being listened to that they don’t want to pay for somebody else’s mistakes half way across that thing they call the ‘Continent’ (the thingy that is apparently someone said cut off and isolated from Britain when the fog descends on the English Channel, and not the other way round). Now, his back is against the wall. Now, he doesn’t know what the heck he is going to do to get himself out of the pickle on he got himself into. So, the only solution is to phone Barack. Imagine the conversation.
Cameron: Hi Barack, I’m up it without a paddle right now and need us to come up with something.
Barack: Errrhhhmm…just lie Dave…tell ‘em you can’t remember!
Cameron: [silence]…
Barack: errrhm, I know, let’s tell them that if you leave Europe, I’ll pull the plugs on you guys!
Cameron: …and nuke us Barack?
Barack: Errrrhm, Dave, not a good idea. Just the first part and it’ll work, believe me.
And, it did work! The British taxpayer is now frightened, alone, cut off from the Continent and cut off from the US. Oh! My Lord! Heaven forbid, they might actually have to start being nice to the Commonwealth countries again. Thankfully, Obama and Cameron saved them from that. Well, alright, it was a dream (nightmare-case scenario?) that might have just come true.
David Cameron announced yesterday that if Britain leaves the EU and slams the door, then the country will lose out on billions in investment that will mean money in every European’s pocket. But, that fake conversation should have gone one step further. Now, Britain, will no longer be the bad, bad boy of Europe, that is stamping its little size 2 shoe in the playground, but it will become the guy that everybody wants to grow up and go out with. Barack just said “If David isn’t there, I’m not coming to your party, even if you pay me!”. Of course, we believe him. Of course, we do! I promise you. Where else would he go? Is he coming to Europe with that billion-dollar-a-year deal just for the benefit of the EU? Is he saving us, really, just because he likes us? Wow! That’s magnanimous, Barack. That’s the billion-dollar man. Super-Barack. And, the EU can’t fail to end up slapping the Brits on the back because they are the ones that brought the deal home!
So, let’s get this straight, if Britain pulls out, the US pulls the pulls the plug and goes elsewhere with a deal worth $15 billion. Britain will be told to go and play elsewhere in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership.
Of course, the talk has gone too far. The priggish, sulky attitude of the dull and boring husband that has told his wife “I don’t love you anymore (in fact, honey, I never did), and I’m leaving you”. It just doesn’t wash Mr. Cameron. We don’t believe even you can imagine for one moment that leaving Europe would be a good thing. There may be some bad points about Europe, but that’s the whole point of democracy, isn’t it? Paying for someone else’s mistakes at times, just in case it becomes my mistake they have to pay for!
Britain, if they left, would lose the possibility of a 500-million person market at their feet (literally). They would lose waving of the import tax of 55% to reach that market. Prices would increase by 12%. The 1.7 million British expats living outside of Britain would have to find ‘alternative arrangements’ (yes, they are British despite the fact that the British government revoked long ago their right to vote in the UK! Democracy! Humbug! If you live outside of the UK for more than 15 years, you lose the right to vote!). The 2.3 million EU-citizens living in Britain would have to do the same. Don’t they play an essential role in the economy of the UK (and not just ‘sponge’, as some might believe)? Wouldn’t Britain have to re-negotiate and go it alone in deals with the European Free-Trade Association (EFTA)? The British would certainly have less clout in the world in terms of defense, wouldn’t they? Well, people would laugh wouldn’t they (!)? Britain certainly wouldn’t have any say as to what was being voted in Brussels at all. Isn’t it better to be there to see what’s going on?
Britain would be $13 billion better off (the money that it has been estimated as transferring for agriculture and to prop up the failing PIGS that are wallowing it muck). But, it’s the businesses that would lose out in the long run in the country as trade would become bureaucratic (they’d have to fill in tons of paperwork) and it will be long and tedious. Europe may not even want to trade with Britain. “If you don’t love me, I don’t love you either”!
But, thankfully, whatever happened on the phone or when Cameron was in Washington. He and Obama cooked up a good one that means that nobody loses face. But, do we really believe it? If we do, maybe we should be asking ourselves why they never thought that far ahead before they blurted out that they were chucking it all in and doing a runner in the first place. It would have saved us all from having to sit through boring programs on whether we should be in or out, or only half way in and half-way out. Let’s all do the hokey-cokey, anyhow! We’re all friends now!
Originally posted on http://www.tothetick.com/britain-finds-excuse-to-stay-in-eu [3]